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UNITED sTATEs PATENT oEEIoE.

ISRAELRIGGIN, OF BALTIMORE, MARYLAND; ROBERT YV. TINDLE, ADMINISTRATOR.

MARINE RAILWAY FOR HAULING UP AND LAUNCI-IING A NUMBER'OF VESSELS ON THE SAME RAILWAY.

Specification of Letters Patent No. 901, dated August 30, 1838.

To all whom it may concern:

Be it lmown that ISRAEL RIGGIN, shipbuilder, late of Baltimore city and State of Maryland, did inventl a new and useful Improvement in Marine Railways, and I, RoB- ERT W. TINDLE, administrator of the estate of said ISRAEL RIGGIN, deceased, do hereby declare that the following is a. :tull and exact description.

I adopt the usual railway as represented in the accompanying drawing, either with rollers or slide rails as in this drawing, but I make the way long enough to receive two or more vessels upon it at once.

I connect the cradles a, a, and b, I), together by means of the rod or tongue c, c. This tongue is fixed to the lower cradle at al, d and passes up under the upper cradle to the end of the projection e c of the upper cradle where a bolt f unites the cradles. I now launch the cradles down into the water till the upper end of the tongue I (which is in the drawing represented as detached and lying on the deck and whose place is be tween f and the windlass 7Ly in place of the rope or chain i), comes to the edge of the water, which gives water enough on the top of the upper cradle to receive or float a vessel on it. Then I attach a rope or chain as represented at z' to the upper end of the upper rod g, the chain reaching to the machinery or engine as represented by the windlass.

N ow I have a vessel on the upper cradle which I haul up and I cradle the second vessel as they move upward, then when I have hauled them up so that the upper tongue g reaches the machinery above I de` tach the upper tongue g as now represented-then I overhaul the chain down and hitch it on to the lower tongue (which is connected with the projection of the upper cradle by means of the bolt f), when I haul the vessels both up the full height required. The pieces at Ic lie on the ways to keep the cradles asunder. To launch, if both vessels are ready to go at once, I lower down t-he length of the upper tongue g by means of the chain. I then detach the chain and at"V knocking away the trippers both vessels go at once.

To launch separately I detach the lower.

tongue c 0 from the upper cradle by withdrawing the bolt f. I then knock away the trippers and launch the lower vessel to haul again a second vessel. I pass my chain through a passage under the upper cradle down to the edge of the water and attach the chain to the upper end of the lower tongue and haul up to the first cradle that is the second cradle up to the first and the tongue up to the machinery at one haul without overhauling the chain. case may require repeat the operation retaining the upper vessel as long as may be required. Y

Some of the advantages of this plan of raising and launching the additional vessels are as follows :The upper vessel after the first day only pays half price for lay days and the lower cradle being able to work every day at whole price, doubles the ad-l vantage in the use of the railway. I can also work double the number of hands and I can as the sell double the amount of materials in the same time.

What I claim as my invention and desire to secure by Letters Patent is The mode or manner of hauling upl and launching the second or third A vessels by means of the tongue constructed and ap-` 

